Thunder owl

When the storm passed over and the sun shone I grabbed the big gun and set off to look for the barn owl. Driving down the lane the sun was shafting through some trees onto a hazy mist rising from the damp fields. With stormy skies on the horizon I was wishing I'd picked up a wider lens too. By the time I parked by the gate the sun had gone. I leaned on the gate and scanned the moss-land through the lens. I soon saw the owl in the distance. Putting on my waterproof over-trousers I decided to try a different viewpoint.

I like the colours - and the fly I hadn't noticed at the time

The owl was still far off as I took a way-marked path along the back of a patchy hedgerow, stopping at each gap to look for the owl and ensure it wouldn't spot me. At the end of the hedge I paused. The owl dropped into the long grass and I hastened over the wooden footbridge and worked my way towards the owl along the edge of a wheat field. The owl popped up and I dropped to my knees to watch it's approach.

Distant barn owl

I couldn't resist some distant shots, but it kept coming closer, and closer. Then it veered off to my right and headed straight for the gate I'd been leaning on. It got very close to the gate before turning back and then heading off through the beech trees. Had I made the wrong decision? I doubt the owl would have gone so close to the gate had I stayed there, so I wasn't too miffed.

 No good larger... ;-)

While the owl was out of sight I crossed a second bridge and sat down on the steps at the end of it. I would keep low and the bridgework should help disguise my outline. The owl reappeared further off and I knelt down in the long grass and thistles. Unfortunately the owl was heading away and continued to do so. Eventually it flew off and away out to the mere. I sat back on the step and waited.

The sky was dark to the west, flashes of lightning coursing over the mere and thunder rumbling. Even so larks and corn buntings were singing. There was no sign of a returning owl so I set off along the path to see where it lead and what there might be to see. The rain and low light was keeping insects in hiding, but the plants were many and varied. When I got level with the place I'd seen the hare on the road the other evening I wondered if I'd see another. I was daydreaming a bit when one materialised and ran off, pausing some forty yards away to sit up and have a good look at me!

The dark area of sky was now heading north, and with no wind I reckoned I was in the eye of the storm, it was darkening in the east too. It seemed a good time to let discretion be the better part of valour and get out of it.

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Everyone's a wildlife photographer

The web seems to be filled with blogs and sites displaying wildlife photographs, many offering prints for sale or images for use via agencies, some even offering photography workshops. The problem is that it's difficult to differentiate the true professionals from the wannabes.

You see it's all too easy to make images that look pin sharp at small sizes on the web. And with the ability for people to comment on blogs the uninitiated praise photos that are actually small versions of noisy crops. They look okay at 400 pixel width, but any larger and they reveal their true quality. Some folks also get sucked in by praise from the undiscerning and think their work is as good as they are told. Then they style themselves as 'wildlife photographers' - pushing it to the limit by adding 'pro' to the title if they have sold just one photo (or maybe less)!

The nature of some on-line photo agencies are less discerning than others. It costs them little to host the photos, so anyone can sign up and claim they have an agent. It all looks very professional - but it's just smoke and mirrors. But so long as nobody gets conned I guess it's pretty harmless fantasising.

Enough of the grumbling. Here's some pics from the garden. All tiny to make my point!

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You never can tell

I popped out with the sun shining after tea intending to hit the marsh and nail some meadow pipit pics. En route the sun disappeared before I got to the first spot I was going to take a look at. Last time I visited this reserve it was looking for butterflies with the close up gear. This time I was equipped with the big lens. Naturally there was hardly a bird to be seen, but there were butterflies galore. I made a feeble attempt with the 150-500 but it didn't work out. The closest focusing distance is way too long.

Small copper

As the light wasn't top hole I changed direction and headed to the lane where I'd photographed the swallows feeding their young. A corn bunting was in evidence but little else. I was about to leave when a barn owl flew into view a way off across the nearby field. It soon made its way out of sight through a row of beeches. I hung around hoping it might return, dithering as to driving further down the lane in the direction the owl had gone. Eventually that was what I did.

Parking up again I got out of the car, without the camera, and leant on a gate to scan the surrounding fields. There was a blackbird singing in the hawthorn by my side which suddenly got agitated. I couldn't work out why, until the owl came into sight flying up the ditch towards me turning through the beech trees and away. I kicked myself. The owl was close enough for a good shot.

Back to the car for the camera in the vain hope the owl would give me an encore. It took a long time for it to reappear, and when it did I was taken by surprise as it materialised between the beech trunks coming across my line of sight from right to left. I took some photos, which could have been better.

For about an hour I watched the owl hunting over a wide area, mostly far away. At one point it made a kill and I saw it fly off with its prey. But it disappeared from view before I could pinpoint where it was heading. When it reappeared it was from a different direction. Maybe it wasn't the same owl. The light was getting worse so I decided to drive round and see if the owl was visible from the opposite direction, so I could get the setting sun (such as it was) behind me. As I left the light improved...

My route took me past a favourite singing post of a well known, and I think often photographed, corn bunting. There it was singing away. The lane is narrow and a four by four was approaching, I let it pass and pulled over. The bird was undeterred, just looking disdainfully at me through the window as I fired away! The first time I took this bird's picture the results were a little soft despite good light. This time the light wasn't quite so good but the photos were much crisper. I think the time in the lens hospital has improved things.

Corn bunting

Leaving the bunting behind when an approaching car forced me to move I kept an eye out for the barn owl without any luck. I did see a hare, which stopped in the middle of the road and legged it back where it had come from as I approached it. A small dark shape scurrying at the edge of the tarmac a couple of hundred yards further on turned out to be a weasel. With no sign at all of the barn owl I was now heading away from its territory.

I'd seen a photo posted on the web of a little owl perched on a tall street light where the road I was taking crosses a dual carriage way. I've looked for it a few times with no joy and as I waited for traffic to pass I glanced up again and looked away. It was double take time. There was a small dark blob at the top of the lamp post! As soon as I was across the central reservation I pulled over and got out - with my camera. Two or three shots over the car roof, and then move closer behind a road sign. The light was quite poor by now and the lamp very high. Still, it was another species photographed. I tried one step more but the owl, that had clocked me straight away, was having none of it. I hadn't planned an owl hunt, but things turned out quite interesting in the end.

Little owl

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Lost in the forest

I normally stay away from the Litter Pit on a sunny Sunday afternoon, so I made the Newt Ponds my first port of call. As it turned out the Litter Pit looked as deserted as the rest of the area. There are some unsavoury characters visit the area, so it was reassuring to see a police van make its way along the lane.

The meadow was alive with butterflies. It was very windy again, but the shelter made the chances of photographing insects better there than elsewhere. I was hoping to catch sight of one of the greenish damsels I had seen a couple of times before so I could get a positive ID, but apart from one male banded demoiselle by the pond all the others were blues of some sort. My efforts at shooting a mating pair failed miserably. They seem much more wary when paired up.

While I was chasing gatekeepers and whites around I heard a 'bustle in the hedgerow', more a crashing in a thicket actually, as if someone had let a big dog loose. I wouldn't have been surprised to see  a large dog running uncontrolled around there. What I did see was a roe deer bounding through the hawthorns towards the smaller pond.

Green-veined white

Leaving the butterflies to their own devices I tried to see where the deer had gone. Needless to say I didn't. Nonetheless I was pleased to have confirmed my thought that deer might lay up in a certain place during daylight. Creeping round the small pond I sussed out a deer trod round its margin, and saw some young reed warblers in the reeds. The pond is well encroached, particularly as it is drying out in this prolonged drought. There were at least two reed warblers in evidence. Making my way back to the larger pond I caught sight of feebly fluttering silvery wings attached to a green damsel. It perched well and gave me plenty of time top take enough shots to get one I was pleased with. Reviewing the shots I noticed the flash was switched off. I'd turned it off to try and grab some warbler pics and forgotten to turn it back on. By the time I did the damsel had flown. Luckily the shots weren't too bad, even with my wobbly hands and the slowish shutter speed. I think it's a female emerald damsel.

Female emerald damselfly?

I could have hung around a lot longer but I wanted to get to the a pond I can never find. With just one missed turning I found it this time! A couple of red admirals greeted my arrival. What I was hoping for were dragonflies and maybe a large red damsel or two. It was not to be. There was a one legged moorhen by the pond and plenty of blue damsels. Not to mention hordes of biting flies. Quite a few of the damsels were paired up. using all my stalking skills I finally got a decent shot. It would be better without the background rush stem, but it's a step forward.

Blue-tailed damselflies

I was tempted to stick around here and see what birds were around. Again I had somewhere else to go. A run around the forest, in the ancient sense rather than the large woodland sense, was in order. As the afternoon was getting on there wasn't too much traffic around. Before setting off I swapped the 70-300 for the 35 so I could take some landscape photos of the rolling moors, limestone walls and sheep the area is noted for. For once I was blessed by sunshine and scudding clouds, meaning my shots looked like the ones everyone else seems to get as a matter of course.

Somewhere in the forest

There were a few birds around as I drove along the narrow, twisting and undulating roads. Some were perching provocatively close to the passing car on drystone walls or thistle tops - pied wagtails and meadow pipits, and goldfinches respectively. Often they'd have beakfuls of food for their young. Of course these perching places always coincided with the narrowest sections of road - preventing me from stopping to get the camera out.

When I spotted a meadow pipit looking me in the eye as I climbed a particularly steep stretch I pulled over at the next opportunity. Getting the big lens out there were pipits all around me! Even so I was unable to stalk close enough to them for a really detailed pic. There was plenty of twittering and it was clearly a family group. I got the impression the youngsters were waiting for mum and dad on the wall when the coast was clear. At one time there were at least four either on the top of the wall or lower down on protruding stones.

By now the wind had died and the sky turned a uniform light grey. I crept alongside the wall, but the pipits had an exclusion zone, and whenever I entered it they would fly up and drop back further along the wall. I just could not get any closer.

Moorland meadow pipit

Near to where I had pulled off the road was a derelict stone barn, one of many in the dales. Often used by the moorland sheep for shelter in inclement weather this barn was the last resting place for one of them.

Dead sheep

My stomach was rumbling and  I headed home, stopping off at a fell that's closer to home for a bit of a look around for future reference.

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The newt pond

The afternoon was free, so with the sun shining I set off for the newt pond, stopping off close by to investigate a farm track that I thought might have butterflies along it. Parking up I saw a buzzard swirling low over a field, but by the time I had the camera ready and got out of the car it had gone. Typical. There were a couple of small tortoiseshells on the path but nothing much else.. When I got back to the car the sun had disappeared like the buzzard. It was threatening rain too.

At the gate to the newt pond I chose to head the other way and have a look over the railway line into territory unknown. Although the public footpaths were obviously used there was hardly any signs of civilisation to be seen. It was like entering another world of little valleys and almost rolling hills. Unusual for this flat part of the county.

Another world

There was little in the way of wildlife at first glance, although I'm sure spending more time there would reveal it. There was an ex-hedgehog lying in a field of maize, flies of many sorts busy laying eggs upon it.

Recycling

Turning back I set off for the pond, which I knew would be sheltered and maybe there'd be a damselfly or two around. There were biting flies if nothing else. Although it was cloudy the air was muggy and I was sweating, my bare arms being a magnet for the blood suckers. The first insects I disturbed were meadow brown butterflies which proved as flighty as always. Flitting away as soon as I would make a move towards them from yards away. The gatekeepers were more obliging. Some settled with their wings spread, but always at awkward angles or behind leaves, making photographs a bit naff. One eventually settled, wings closed, long enough for me to sneak up on it and get a decent shot.

Gatekeeper

Making my way along the flattened path round the lake, avoiding the various droppings along it, I put up some damsels. Mostly they were blue-tailed, but some looked like azures. One, which I almost got a shot off but didn't, looked a little larger and decidedly less blue. That'll have to wait for a positive ID. I wasn't too bothered about photographing  the blue-tailed damsels but the azures I put some effort into. I got a couple of half decent shots, but the one I liked best was spoiled by a blurred blade of grass or something. It was interesting to watch one perched, arching its abdomen to, apparently,  brush its wings.

Azure damselfly

After spending some time inspecting deer droppings and looking for their tracks and paths around the pond, wondering if I might be able to hide up some time and photograph them, the rain arrived. Only a light, refreshing, drizzle. Quite welcome but not beneficial to camera equipment. Having nothing to protect the camera and flash with I hurried back to the car.

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